Monday, August 10, 2009

What's your suggestion?

I've got a simple question to ask the teabaggers and assorted "revolutionaries" who are rising up in protest over Barack Obama, health care reform and proclaiming challenges to truth, justice and the American way.

What's your suggestion?

The conservative puppetmasters pulling the strings on these astroturf protests held the White House for eight years, The also held Congress for 12 years -- six of which overlapped with the Bush presidency.

What did you do to solve the health care access crisis when you held all the power? What did you do to solve the problem of Wall Street ripping off America? What did you do the prevent deficits?

The answers are pretty obvious.

Obama has had about eight months to begin to tackle the mess created by the GOP puppetmasters who think new tactics amount to calling someone a socialist, not a communist. The same folks who once railed at the left for disruptive and yes even treasonous attacks on our elected leader are now carrying the pitchforks they accused us of wielding.

I'd be delighted to carry on a rational argument about an alternative health care proposal. I don't see much value in shout downs that offer nothing concrete, save for lies about "death panels."

Wall Street isn't the only thing that went bankrupt during the Bush years. So did Republican values.

I"m happy to engage in rational argument but spare me the fear tactics and the lies.

4 Comments:

No, we spend a lot on health care, and if the trend continues, then it will take up too much of the GDP and will hinder productivity. We as a nation are not there yet.

Myth: When it comes to health care, we underperform industrialized countries.

Not really a myth, but rather a half truth. There are statistics that indicate we lag many industrialized countries. There are many statistics where we excel. Whether our method of insurance caused either is VERY questionable.

From a strictly economic point of view, the reason the current "system" is unsustainable is this:

"The patient is [then] separated from the transaction in the sense that costs are no longer his concern. And when the patient doesn’t care about costs, only those who want higher costs—like doctors and drug companies—care."

A free-market approach starting along the lines Laffer suggests would work with market forces to control costs, not against them:

"A patient-centered health-care reform begins with individual ownership of insurance policies and leverages Health Savings Accounts, a low-premium, high-deductible alternative to traditional insurance that includes a tax-advantaged savings account. It allows people to purchase insurance policies across state lines and reduces the number of mandated benefits insurers are required to cover. It reallocates the majority of Medicaid spending into a simple voucher for low-income individuals to purchase their own insurance. And it reduces the cost of medical procedures by reforming tort liability laws."

And the "safety net" that we all agree is necessary? It should be what insurance used to mean, and not what it has become.